Charlton host Bristol City in the Championship on 6 February 2016.
Photograph: TGSPhoto/Rex/Shutterstock

Charlton turn to new, old face to clear path out of valley of doom | Owen Gibson

Read more

With just the one win from their last 13 games, Charlton Athletic have slipped to the bottom of the Championship. Protests at The Valley against owner Roland Duchâtelet and Katrien Meire, the club’s chief executive, have had little effect so far. Since taking over the club in January 2014, Duchâtelet has overseen five managerial changes. This alarming lack of consistency is a far cry from the stability at Charlton during Alan Curbishley’s Premier League reign a decade ago.

‘We are protesting at the disassembly of the very soul of our club’

Chris Burton has been supporting Charlton Athletic since the late 1980s. “I was brought up in Norwood, and because Charlton were groundsharing with Crystal Palace at the time, I became attached to the club. But the real influence in choice of team was my dad. My grandfather took him to The Valley in the 1940s.” Chris and his son Jack are season ticket holders in the West Stand and attend every home game. Jack’s first game at The Valley was Chris Powell’s final appearance as a Charlton player, a fine 4-1 win against Coventry City on 4 May 2008. “I’m proud that Jack is a fourth-generation supporter. While I was the main influence, he’d seen his grandparents as season ticket holders and my wife Jane successfully converted from being a Manchester United supporter.”

‘My son Jack at the Charlton protests. The protest against the owner was attended by more than the 2% of fans the CEO claimed were unhappy.’ Photograph: Chris Burton/GuardianWitness

Chris singles out Charlton’s epic 1998 play-off final victory at Wembley, a 7-6 penalty shoot-out victory over Sunderland after a pulsating 4-4 draw as a memorable moment, but there’s a more recent one he shares with his son. “Since inflicting the decline of the club on Jack, I think our favourite shared moment was when pitchside announcer Dave Lockwood declared us League One champions in 2012. And one of Jack’s proudest moments was walking out as a mascot with his favourite player Yann Kermorgant. He was one of the first players our current owner allowed to leave the club.”

Like many Charlton fans, Chris is concerned about how the club is run these days. “The problem with Duchâtelet is that he is perceived to be conducting an experiment with our club. Just a few months after buying the club, he sacked club legend Chris Powell and immediately lost the support of a lot of loyal fans. He has undoubtedly invested some money at Charlton, but has rarely watched the team play. Jack’s League One heroes were sold off one by one, and they’ve been replaced by inadequate players from Duchâtelet’s network of European clubs. The experiment just hasn’t worked.”

Charlton Athletic collect the trophy after the League One play-off final against Sunderland at Wembley on 25 May 1998. Photograph: Shaun Botterill/Allsport

Chris is also wary of the managerial merry-go-round that has starved the club of stability. “Since Powell we’ve had José Riga, Bob Peeters, Guy Luzon, Karel Fraeye and now Riga again. The fact that they are head coaches rather than managers suggests that decisions about recruitment and the sale of players are completely out of their hands.”

Duchâtelet’s appointment of Katrien Meire as the club’s CEO is another unpopular decision. Meire, a 30-year-old lawyer, has attracted fans’ ire by referring to them as “customers” and Chris is scathing of her performance at the club. “Many of us think Katrien treats Charlton fans with an arrogant disdain and her prime concern is how the club can be marketed. Her quotes about football being a loyalty brand, is just one example of the corporate nonsense that has driven a wedge between the fans and the club.”

Yann Kermorgant playing for Charlton Athletic in 2014. Jack’s favourite player was one of the first to leave under Duchâtelet. Photograph: Matthew Childs/Action Images

Despite the turmoil, Chris remains firmly loyal to the club. “I became a Charlton fan after the financial difficulties of the early 1980s and the move away from The Valley. So we were always on the up during my first 20 years of supporting the club. The last couple of years have been really depressing. Results on the pitch haven’t been entirely uplifting but that isn’t why we are protesting.

“We are protesting at the disassembly of a thing we love, not necessarily bricks and mortar, but the very soul of our club. The fans have on the whole carried out their promise to support the team, not the regime but I can’t see the 12th man being enough to keep Charlton in the second tier. And part of me fears that relegation would be another nail in the coffin of a club already reeling from regular poor decisions. At least another stint in League One might finally make Duchâtelet declare his experiment with the club a failed one.”

‘The fans’ drive is needed with the club facing relegation and years of decline’

Shane Kelly has also passed the Charlton Athletic baton to his son Oisín. “I was born in Woolwich and raised in south east London. My son was thrown straight into a Charlton Athletic baby grow when he was born in 2007.”

Shane has supported Charlton for nearly 25 years and is deeply concerned about the plight of the club. “I was in my early twenties when Charlton returned to The Valley in 1992, and that’s when I really started supporting them regularly. For the club to return to their home ground was an incredible achievement. Without the dedication, drive and stubbornness of the fans to overcome a hostile local council, it’s difficult to imagine the club ever returning to SE7. There’s always been intelligence behind the club’s support and that was born out of the battle for The Valley. That drive and stubbornness is needed once again this season with the club facing relegation and years of decline.”

‘My son Oisín has so far refused to have his head turned by more glamorous alternatives.’ Photograph: Shane Kelly/GuardianWitness

While losing to Millwall is always a low point in the life of any Charlton supporter, Shane acknowledges that many of his worst moments as a fan have come under the current ownership. He fears for Charlton’s future and especially the club’s younger fans. “Despite recent travails, Oisín has remained loyal. It seems to me that the current owner cares very little about what makes a football club special to its supporters and community. As crowds plummet it will be harder and harder to convince the next generation of supporters to walk through the turnstiles. Sadly that could include my son.”

As part of the protests at Charlton, fans aren’t buying programmes, merchandise, food or drinks from the club. Photograph: SE7ite/GuardianWitness

So is there any way that Duchâtelet and Meire can redeem themselves and get back into the fans’ good books? “Our CEO’s arrogance, incompetence and ignorance is well documented, and available for all to see. Supporters are ‘weird’ for daring to have a sense of ownership of the club. We go through head coaches like a knife goes through butter, yet each of our five appointments in the last two years have apparently improved the football. The protests at The Valley are genuine expressions of anger, frustration and a complete lack of faith in those currently running the club. The owner’s bizarre ‘Euro-network’ experiment has shown no sign of working, but more alarmingly he shows no sign of learning.”

Despite everything Shane suggests a majority of supporters still back the team and sympathise with the players. “There are some players with the old Charlton spirit and there’s no better example than our captain Johnny Jackson. But most of the team is made up of poor imports and promising youngsters who are being exposed to Championship football far too early. That’s not their fault. The fault lies entirely at boardroom level.”